Winter Wonderland
by Depudor
Summary: Jake and Hamilton pull a prank to celebrate the end of Fall Semester, and a call from her mother forces Jake to rethink her holiday plans. I wrote this nearly four years ago but am publishing here now by request.
1. Sweet Kisses

**The show**: If you never saw _Young Americans_, which apparently many of you did not, it's a show about a poor 15-year-old kid named Will Krudski who gets a scholarship to attend a prestigious boarding school called Rawley Academy. You don't need to remember his name, however, because I write about Jake and Hamilton. Jake is actually Jacqueline Pratt, who is neglected by her actress single mother and decides to make a point by disguising herself as a guy and enrolling at a boys' school so that when she gets caught, her mother will realize how oblivious she's been. It all gets very _Twelfth Night_ when Jake falls for Hamilton Fleming, the son of the dean. If you want to know more about them, you can read my profile. Scout is Will's roommate, and Finn is their English teacher a la Robin Williams in _Dead Poets' Society_.

**Disclaimer**: I don't own these characters but use them only for the enjoyment of my fellow residents of Denialville.

**Summary**: Jake and Hamilton pull a prank to celebrate the end of Fall Semester, and a call from her mother forces Jake to rethink her holiday plans. 

**Thanks**: To those of you who requested that I dig up this story after RR went down. You make me feel so appreciated. And thank you also for the Silver Oar Award, which I believe this won for best J/H story.

* * *

Oh, how Jake loved study time.

Her chest rested against Hamilton's stomach as he lay on his back on her bed and she lay stretched out right on top of him, her book propped on his chest and the way-too-small print swimming before her tired eyes. As she looked down, her attention wandered off the page and onto Hamilton's crimson sweater. That was her new favorite thing about winter – Hamilton looked great in a sweater.

Her gaze drifted upward, and she could see that the book Hamilton held up over his eyes was beginning to sink, lower and lower until it covered his face. Jake knew he was falling asleep, as he usually did somewhere between ten and fifteen pages into his reading assignments. Normally she wouldn't rush to wake him up, but tomorrow was the last day of fall semester, a full day of final exams, and then they'd be separated for three weeks of winter break. So every moment of the evening that Hamilton didn't spend studying he'd better spend kissing her.

Jake slipped the cap back on her highlighter and urged softly, "Hamilton, wake up."

"No," came his muffled response from underneath his book.

"Come on." She lifted _Tess__ of the D'Urbervilles_ off his face and scooted forward so her mouth was right over his. "Hey, you've still got fifty more pages."

Hamilton opened his eyes when he felt her breath on his face. He reached up and grasped her head in his hands and pulled her down for a kiss. She happily returned it. His lips were so sweet -- literally -- he tasted like the peanut brittle and butter toffee he'd been munching on, Christmas candy from little holly-covered tins. Gifts for the Dean, mostly food baskets, had been pouring into the Fleming house all week from alumni, friends, and teachers. Hamilton would often show up in Jake's room with a cheese wheel and shrink-wrapped sausages or shortbread and German spice cookies. One day he had even brought her several tiny jars of jam.

"What do I do with a bunch of jars of jam?" she had asked him.

"I don't know. You're a girl. I thought girls like little jars of things."

"Gee... thanks."

"You can put it on a scone or something."

"Did you bring any scones?"

"No."

"Oh."

So the little jam jars had gone into hiding with the other girl stuff, under the bed with the tampons and fashion magazines. Oh, but she loved him. For everything he did that was sweet and stupid.

And now, sinking into his buttery sweet mouth, she didn't care about anything else but him. She didn't care about the English Lit final, the American History final. Plane Geometry was just plain pointless. All that mattered was this warm body beneath her. She grasped at crimson wool, as if she could dig through his sweater to feel his chest. Hamilton slid one hand down her front and slipped his fingers between the buttons of her shirt. His other hand still grabbed at her head, keeping her lips firmly against his, mouth open. He felt like he couldn't kiss her deep enough. He always wanted to go deeper. They both did. It was getting harder to accept that kissing was enough.

Actually, it hadn't been enough for quite a while. They'd been together for almost five months now, and ever since the chastely erotic visit to New York, they'd been exploring various states of nakedness. But Jake insisted they weren't ready for sex. They were only sixteen, after all.

Only sixteen, only five months together… but already inside each other in so many ways.

Their mouths never separated as Jake moved her legs to straddle Hamilton, her thighs pressing against his hips. Her hands went around his neck, and she pulled her lips away just long enough to murmur, "Hamilton . . ." -- as if by saying his name she could somehow draw him closer.

"Mmmmm. Jake, baby --" he moaned softly as he rolled over so that they were side by side. Books were pushed aside and then dropped to the floor. "I can't take three weeks without you."

"I know. I can't either."

Hamilton leaned forward so he was almost on top of her. He began unbuttoning her shirt, placing baby kisses on her neck that grew more passionate as he moved toward her chest, lower and lower . . .

Until a knock on the door, loud and insistent, broke his concentration. Hamilton let out an exasperated sigh and sank his forehead against her chest.

Jake lowered her voice an octave. "Who is it?" she yelled.

An all-too-familiar voice came through the closed door for the third time that evening. "It's Scout. Can I come in?"

Hamilton groaned, then whispered, "Tell him to go away."

"What do you want now?" Jake called to Scout.

"Study questions for history. Will said you had some."

"Scout, I already gave them to him!"

"They only go up to the Louisiana Purchase. You've got more, right?"

"Can't I just e-mail them to you?"

"Come on, Jake. I need them now! I'm totally screwed without those questions."

Jake sighed. "Hold on, I'm coming!" She kissed Hamilton's forehead in apology.

Hamilton raised his head from her chest and looked at her seriously. "Do you like Scout?"

"What do you mean?" She gave him a confused look back as she pulled away from him and stood up.

"I mean, you wouldn't mind too much if I killed him, would you?"

Jake smiled at him for just a second then opened the door to find both Scout and Will standing in the hallway. They walked into her room, both of them holding their hands behind their backs.

Scout eyed Jake and her tousled hair, then cast a glance at Hamilton on the bed. "How do you guys get any studying done?"

Jake ignored this question. "Hold on a sec. I'll print out the questions."

"Don't bother," replied Scout. "I don't actually need them."

"What?!" Hamilton demanded, getting pissed.

Will looked at Hamilton. "Every time we come in Jake's room, you're here, and you're either working at the computer with her sitting in your lap, or you're reading a book with her on top of you."

"So?"

"So," Scout explained, "between studying for finals and writing term papers, Will and I haven't gotten any action for at least a month. The girls are all sequestered at their dorm like there's a plague or something."

"Why are you telling us this?" asked Jake warily.

"We just want the two of you to know that we hate you." Scout smiled slightly after he said this, a mischievous glimmer in his eyes.

"And we think," added Will, reaching behind his back and drawing a water gun, "that you need to cool off!"

Will took aim at Hamilton, who yelled and flipped over to shield his face from the spray. Scout drew a Super Soaker of his own and squirted Jake as she darted away toward the bed. She started to scream then stopped herself, remembering that the door was wide open.

"You are so gonna die, Krudski!" Hamilton yelled as he writhed on the bed, Will soaking his back with an almost continuous stream of cold water.

Scout managed to get several nice wet shots at Jake's head before she ducked behind the bed.

She grabbed a pillow and threw it at him, but he just laughed, so she grabbed Hamilton's book and threw that. She almost nailed Scout right below the belt, but he managed to catch the book.

"Hey, watch the aim!" he yelled. He looked at the cover. "You're still reading _Tess_?"

"That's mine!" Hamilton shouted from inside Jake's bedspread, which he had managed to wrap himself in.

"Ham, this spine looks barely cracked," Scout teased.

That was the last straw. Hamilton threw back the bedspread and lunged at Scout with eyes on fire.

Will yelled a warning. "Dude, run!!"

"Shit!" Scout shrieked. He knew that a pissed-off Hamilton was dangerous, and he took off running down the hall with Hamilton chasing after him. Will decided he'd better go save Scout, so he disappeared out the door as well.

Alone, Jake shook her wet head and flopped down on the bed. She thought for a minute, then got up and started gathering Hamilton's books and papers and putting them in his backpack.

"What are you doing?" Hamilton asked from the doorway.

Jake looked up, startled by his sudden reappearance. "I thought you were kicking Scout's ass."

"I was going to, but then I realized that this is probably all part of their evil plan to trick me into spending less time with you." He came in and closed the door behind him. "And I refuse to be baited into their trap."

Jake half-smiled. She tossed him his backpack. "Go home Hamilton."

"Why?!"

"Because Scout's right. We're not going to get any studying done this way. And I need to pass all my exams so I can complete a full semester at one school and have some hope of graduating before I'm 30. Besides, you're all wet. You need to change."

"I bet you have something I could change into."

"No."

"What's the use of having a girlfriend who dresses like a guy if I can't borrow any of her clothes?"

"Go. I mean it."

Hamilton hung his head. "I can't believe you're kicking me out."

"Awww. . . don't pout, Hammie."

Jake went to him and slid her arms around his waist. She put her nose against his and tilted his head back up. "You'll see me tomorrow night. And we'll finish fall semester with a bang."

Hamilton's whole expression changed, his face lighting up. "Yeah! We're all-systems-go for 4:15. Remember, we've got to get to the computer lab tomorrow right after the last exam."

His military reference amused her. "Should we synchronize our watches?" she teased.

"I'm not _that_ bad, am I?"

"No, it's just funny to see you so excited about this."

"It's gonna be so cool, baby, you're not going to believe it."

"I wrote the launch program, so I can believe it. What I can't believe is that I'm contributing to your juvenile delinquency."

She smiled at him, and Hamilton stole a kiss. "I'm not ready to go," he whispered.

Jake kissed him back, not ready to let him go yet either – for the night or for the next three weeks. She turned her head to look at the frost-glazed window and the late December night beyond it. The winter had been strangely devoid of snow, but it was definitely cold, and she hated sending him out into the freezing night.

She leaned her forehead against his. "You get five minutes."

"Five minutes of what?"

Jake smiled and whispered, "Five minutes of whatever you want."

Hamilton raised an eyebrow suggestively. "You know, there are a lot of things that I could do to you in five minutes."

"Yeah, but would I still respect you in the morning?"


	2. Bad News

_Sunlight._

_It was so bright as Jake sat looking at the lake, she almost couldn't see anything. She had a strange feeling that there was somewhere else she was supposed to be. Where she was at that moment was wrong . . . but she needed to be there._

_Scout handed her a pinwheel. Its bright colors whirled in the wind and sparkled as they caught the light._

_"Don't you need it?" asked Jake._

_"You need it more. I have hot dogs and apple pie."_

_Jake didn't smile. It was sweet of Scout, but she didn't want anyone feeling sorry for her._

_"Where's __Hamilton__?" Scout inquired._

_Jake looked at the lake. "He's out there." And she knew he was, even though she couldn't see him. But at that moment, __Hamilton__ flew up from the middle of the lake and arced over in a dive like a dolphin. Or maybe it really was a dolphin. "He knocked," Jake explained, "but I told him he couldn't come in."_

_"Some people don't need to knock." But this wasn't Scout – it was her mother._

_"Mom!"__ Jake cried. "What are you doing here?"_

_"I shouldn't have let you come here alone, Jacqueline. I'm sorry I've been so far away."_

_"You're not mad at me for enrolling at a boys' school?"_

_"No, I know you did it because you were angry with me, because I neglected you. But that's all going to change. I love you, and from now on we'll always be together, just the two of us."_

_"But how?"___

_"I'm going to go to Rawley Girls. I'll just pretend I'm 15. We'll paint our toenails and braid our hair. From now on, I'll never miss a thing."_

_"Oh, Mom!__ Mom, I love you!" Jake threw her arms around her mother._

_"I want to come in, Jacqueline. Into your world."_

_"Come in. You don't have to knock." And yet she could hear the knocking, and it wouldn't stop. "Mom!"_

_"Jacqueline – " _

"Jake!" This was Hamilton's voice, filtered through the door of Jake's room and the door of unconsciousness.

Jake's eyes flew open and a horrible feeling gripped her chest. She sat up, and the dream disappeared as she looked at the bedside clock. 7:45. The first exam was at 8:00.

"Oh, God, no!" she cried. "Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap!"

Hamilton was still knocking on the door. Jake tossed aside the pillow she was hugging and jumped out of bed to unlock the door and open it.

"What took you so long?" Hamilton grumbled as he stormed in and closed the door with his foot. He held a styrofoam cup in one hand and something wrapped in a napkin in the other, both of which he set down on the dresser. Only then did he notice that Jake wore nothing but a T-shirt and boxers. And she had serious bed hair. "Oh, God. Tell me you didn't oversleep!"

"Fine, then tell me it's not really 7:45." She rubbed her eyes.

"Jake, how could you oversleep the morning of finals?!"

"Gee, I don't know. Maybe if someone hadn't kept me up playing 'Things We Can Do to Jake When She Doesn't Have a Shirt On,' I could've gone to sleep at a decent hour."

Too rushed to be self-conscious, Jake pulled off her shirt and walked half-naked to her dresser. Hamilton smiled at the memory of last night and instinctively moved closer to her, but she shot him a look that warned him to back off. Hamilton crossed his arms to keep his hands to himself.

"Well, at least you got to sleep in," he said wryly. All this got from Jake was another dirty look.

Not even bothering with a bra, Jake picked up her corset, wrapped it around her chest and pulled tight to overlap the velcro. Hamilton still winced every time he saw her strap herself in, but he was getting used to it.

"Relax," he said. "We'll get there in time."

Jake grabbed a shirt from the closet. "So, not that I'm not grateful you showed up, but why are you here?"

"I stopped by the dining hall to get some coffee. And you'll never guess what they had."

"What?"

"Scones."

Jake stopped buttoning her shirt and looked at him. They both smiled.

Hamilton picked up the crumbly goodies he had carefully wrapped up for her. "They always have special treats for finals day. Usually it's blueberry muffins, but I guess this year they got trendy."

Jake grabbed a pair of slacks and stepped into them, longing for summer session when they didn't have to worry about a dress code. She would've given anything to slide into a crumpled pair of jeans. She pulled on a thick wool sweater, then saw herself in the mirror and sighed. "I'm a mess."

"No, you're not."

She grabbed a tube of toothpaste off the dresser and squeezed a dab on her finger and sucked on it. Hamilton turned her around to face him. He licked his palms and ran his hands over her hair, smoothing it back and down. She smiled at him, and he leaned into her lips.

"No, Hamilton, we don't have time."

"One kiss. Please, just one."

She gave in. She never really had a chance. But when was one kiss ever enough? One melted into two, two boiled over into three, three desperately sought out four, and four completely surrendered to five. Jake never would have let go had Hamilton not pulled away.

"Exams," he said breathlessly, trying to be the strong one.

"Right."

* * *

When they stepped outside into the chilled winter air, a fine layer of white covered the ground and frosted the trees. Jake stopped and looked all around, her jaw dropping as she took in the beauty of it all.

"Hamilton! It snowed!"

She was so entranced, Hamilton had to grab her arm and pull her after him. They took off toward the main classroom building across the empty quad.

"Yeah, it started last night when I was walking home. I almost called you, actually I almost went back to your room so we could watch the first Rawley snowfall together. But I knew you wanted to study."

"What about you?" Jake asked. "Did you finish reading _Tess_?"

"Nope. I got home and went straight to sleep. Almost."

"Almost?"

"Well, I was thinking about you, so I did one thing before I went to bed . . ."

"You did?"

"I wrapped your Christmas present."

Jake grinned. He got her on that one. "So where is it?"

"I'll give it to you tomorrow, before you leave for the airport." As they rushed through the snow, Hamilton broke off a chunk of scone and handed it to Jake.

"So you didn't do any reading last night?" she asked. "Aren't you worried about English?"

"It'll be a breeze. Finn's being nice, throwing in some short answer questions along with the essays."

"Somebody's got to introduce that guy to the concept of multiple choice."

"Finn? Multiple choice? No way. He'd never give us the opportunity to guess. That wouldn't require enough deep thinking."

"I was totally psyched when I heard the history final was all true-or-false, until I found out we had to explain our answers. I only got halfway through _The Federalist Papers_, and –"

"Don't worry about _The Federalist Papers_. Mr. Tibbets is obsessed with war. As far as he's concerned, there's the Revolution, 1812, and the Civil War, and not much in between."

"But I only went through my study questions once."

"OK, true or false: The Boston Massacre incited the Revolutionary War."

"Um . . . yikes. I know it pissed a lot of people off, so . . . true?"

"Wrong! It's false. The massacre was mainly colonist propaganda spread after the war was inevitable." He handed her another piece of scone.

Jake looked perplexed as she chewed. "That wasn't in the study questions."

"No. But I happen to know that Mr. Tibbets uses that question on the final every year."

Jake looked at Hamilton as it finally dawned on her the advantage that he had, being so familiar with the curriculum.

"You're going to ace every exam, aren't you?" she asked.

A guilty grin spread over Hamilton's face. "I'll tell you this much; I never so much as touched _The Federalist Papers_. Or the study questions."

They had already reached the steps of the classroom building, but instead of going up, Jake bent down to scoop up a handful of snow. "You know what, Fleming? I think it's time for the first snowball of the year."

And with that, she smashed the snow against his head.

* * *

Finn watched his students hunched over their exams. He met another gaze from Will, who was the first one done, of course, and had already been sitting twiddling his thumbs for five minutes. Finn continued to survey the room, and his eyes rested on Hamilton, who was still scribbling away.

Finn looked up at the clock. It was already two minutes past four. He knew how much the other teachers, especially the tweedy old-school Rawley types, would disapprove if they knew that he gave his students extra time. But he really wanted to read everything they had to say, and that made it hard to cut them off.

"OK, gentlemen, that's it! Pencils down, essay books closed. Congratulations, you have completed fall semester at Rawley Academy. Have a great holiday, everybody. And before you go, don't forget to pick up a copy of your winter break reading assignments."

The students collectively groaned.

"Just kidding," Finn said with a crooked grin.

As Hamilton finally closed his booklet, Jake smiled knowingly. The shell-shocked look on his face was adorable. She leaned over and whispered, "Not so easy, huh?"

Hamilton scowled. "I hate short answer questions. They require you to know details. At least with essay questions you can bullshit if you haven't finished the book."

The other students handed in their exams and began filing out. Will and Scout lingered at Finn's desk.

"Mr. Krudski, you excited to go back to the nest for break?" Finn probed.

"About as excited as my dad is to have me. He's already turned my room into a museum for his foreign beer can collection."

"You know, Will, Christmas can be a healing time for family," Finn said.

Jake walked up followed by Hamilton, who took this opportunity to punch Will in the arm. Finn raised his eyebrows and started to say something, but Will just grinned good-naturedly and rubbed the spot.

"What about you, Finn?" Will asked. "You seeing family?"

"No, for some of us it really is too late. But that's why we've got Moosehead. I'll be on the slopes."

"Skiing for me, too," said Scout. "The Calhouns are doing Christmas in Aspen this year."

"What about you, Jake?"

"Paris. That's where my mom's show is right now. Which reminds me, she left me a message, so I'd better go call her. You guys have a great break." She gave Will and Scout each a pinch on the back of the neck.

"Ow!" they cried in unison.

Jake waved to Finn and took off. Hamilton started to protest, and Jake turned back, remembering. "I'll meet you there!" she called as she disappeared into the hallway.

"Gearing up for your last night together?" Will asked.

"Not that it's any of your business," Hamilton snapped.

"Just because we're jealous doesn't mean we're not curious."

Finn knew where this was going. "Gentlemen, if you're going to talk shop, please don't do it in here. I shouldn't even know about any of this."

Hamilton looked at Finn, and a tiny smile lifted his lips. "Thanks, Finn. I really mean it. Thanks to you, I've had the best semester of my life." He held out his hand, and Finn shook it. "I hope you have a fantastic Christmas, Finn."

"You, too, Hamilton."

* * *

"Mom, it's me," Jake said into her cell phone.

"Jacqueline, sweetie. -- No, you can't do my lips now, I'm talking to my daughter."

"Huh? What are you doing?"

"Sorry, honey, I'm in the make-up chair."

"OK. I got your message. What's up?"

"Oh, sweetie, I'm afraid we might have to postpone the whole Christmas thing."

"Mom, you can't postpone Christmas. It kind of is when it is."

"I know, but I'm just not going to have as much time to spend with you as I'd hoped. We had to reschedule two performances when I made the _huge_ mistake of telling my dimwitted co-star about my cure for jet lag, and she got it backwards and took _two_ melatonin and _four_ Valium, all of which, mind you, she washed down with champagne. What a moron! They found her passed out in the first class lounge." Suddenly Monica shouted, "Would you stop with the blush! You're making me look like a French whore!"

Jake could hear the voice of a rather perturbed make-up artist reply, "I'm trying to make you look twenty-five, which, if I'm not mistaken, is the age of your character."

"Oh, yeah, you're right," Monica conceded. "OK, blush me." She turned her attention back to the phone. "Anyway, Jacqueline, I hate to make you fly all the way to Paris when I only get one day off. I mean, you're welcome to come hang out at the hotel, do some shopping, see the show, but wouldn't you rather have a real Christmas with your cousins in Palm Springs?"

Jake rolled her eyes. "Yeaaah… right. Because nothing says 'Christmas' like palm trees and golf."

Monica wasn't really listening. "Fine, fine," she said to the make-up artist. "OK, honey, they have to do my lips now. You talk for a minute. How's school?"

"Yeah, speaking of school, Mom, I've got to get to class. Let me think about this, and I'll call you later."

"OK, honey. I love you!"

"Yeah. Me too."


	3. The Prank

Hamilton was looking at his watch as Jake walked into the darkened library.

"Sorry I'm late," she said.

"I was starting to think we should've synchronized our watches after all." But Hamilton was too excited to be annoyed. He grabbed her hand and started to pull her toward him for a kiss but stopped as soon as he saw her eyes. "What's the matter?"

"Oh, just another uplifting conversation with my mother."

"You want to talk about it?"

"No." But the tears were still welling up in her eyes.

"Baby, come here." He tried to put his arms around her, but Jake backed away, knowing that if she felt him against her she would break.

"No, let's get this done. We have to hurry."

"If something happened with your mom, that's more important than some stupid prank."

"Since when is it a stupid prank? You've been planning this for two months." Jake walked to a doorway and into the computer lab, and Hamilton followed her. He could tell she wanted to change the subject, so he let it go.

"I actually thought this up over a year ago," he said. "But I needed someone with computer expertise."

Jake slipped her backpack off her shoulder and set it on the counter next to a computer. "I had no idea you were such a prankster."

"It's a tradition. Every semester at Rawley ends with a really stellar prank, but for the last four years the resident physics genius, Colin Prescott, had a lock on the prankmaster throne. Some of his were brilliant. I still don't know where he got that cow."

"Ah, yes, the old cow-on-the-roof. Always good for a laugh."

"Yeah, but my dad could've done without the phone calls from PETA. But anyway, Prescott finally graduated, and I think I should take his crown. After all, I have something he didn't have."

"What's that?"

Hamilton dangled his extensive set of keys. "Access."

"But won't that just make you the main suspect, more likely to get caught?"

"I like how you think, Pratt. One step ahead of the game. And that's something else I have that Colin Prescott didn't have."

"What?"

"You."

Jake smiled, something painful still distracting her as she motioned toward the computers. "You really want to take twelve of these?"

"I'd take all of them if we could, but thirty monitors would be overkill. I think twelve will do, make a nice layout – if we just take the 17-inch screens. What do you think?"

"I can configure as many as you want, but how do we get them all up on the roof?"

"That's the beautiful part. See, years ago this library was the old dining hall, and this computer room was the kitchen, so . . . " He walked over to a bookcase and pushed it aside, revealing a square hole in the wall. "There's a dumb waiter."

"Wow. That's so cool. How'd you know that was there?"

"Because during winter break, when all the students and teachers are gone, I have plenty of time to explore. But the dumb waiter only goes to the second floor. So we have to get them to the roof from there. But I've got it all worked out."

* * *

The sun had set by the time Jake and Hamilton hoisted the last of the computers up on the roof of the library. Jake looked down at the snow-covered quad below them, lit gold and violet by the dying sunlight.

"How are they ever going to get these down?" Jake wondered aloud.

"That's rule number one of any good prank. It should be near-impossible for the authorities to remove."

"Um, 'the authorities'? You mean your dad?"

"I'm referring to the administration in general." This made Jake laugh, and Hamilton sighed. "OK, for the purposes of this evening, can we refer to him as 'the authorities'?"

"Sure, babe. Whatever toots your horn." Jake pulled some cables out of her backpack and began hooking up the computers as Hamilton turned on a flashlight so she could see.

"I was afraid we'd lose the light too quickly," Hamilton complained.

"We'll be fine. I could do this with my eyes closed."

"Good. I don't think anyone's gonna notice us up here, but still, I want to keep the flashlights to a minimum."

"Whatever you say. You're the mastermind. I'm just the techie."

"You're not just the techie. You're _my_ techie." He knelt behind her and put a hand on her shoulder.

Jake smiled slightly. "Grab me the power strip, will ya?" Hamilton handed her the strip, one of the many components he had surreptitiously installed on the library roof over the past few days to save time that afternoon. Jake plugged in one of the computers, attached a keyboard, and turned it on. A loud cheerful ding let her know that it was working. "OK. All I have to do is set up a local area network. I'll make this one the server, and I'll dial in from my lap-top to activate the program." She stuck the disk in the drive. "It should be totally untraceable to us."

Hamilton shook his head in awe. "Wow." He watched her for a second, then looked at his watch again. "We only have half an hour if we want to catch everyone on their way to dinner."

"No problem. You can start arranging the monitors." She took off her gloves and began typing furiously. It was getting really cold.

Hamilton carried a few of the computer monitors over to the edge of the roof and stacked them on top of each other, testing them for stability. He walked back to get another one but stopped to watch Jake, trying to read her face. Finally he went over and sat down next to her. She was very focused on her work.

"Jake?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you going to tell me what happened with your mom?"

Jake took a deep breath and exhaled, her breath crystallizing in the frozen air. She kept her eyes on the computer screen as she said, "I'm not going to Paris. My mom's too busy."

Hamilton sighed. He didn't know what to say. It was impossible for him to believe that anyone could be too busy to make time for Jake, especially at Christmas.

"But don't worry about me," she said in response to his silence. "I'll be fine."

"Where are you going to go?"

"I'm not sure. Probably New York, but Consuela won't be there, so I don't know."

"You can't spend Christmas alone."

"Don't worry about it."

"Jake!" Hamilton put his hand over the computer screen and made her look at him. "Do you really think I'm not going to worry about this?"

Jake was silent.

"You can stay here," Hamilton said.

"No one can stay in the dorms during winter break."

"I don't mean the dorms. I mean, you'll stay at my house, with me."

"What? I can't do that."

"Sure you can. My parents have had students stay with us lots of times when their holiday plans fell through at the last minute. And especially if it's a friend of mine. They know you. I know they wouldn't mind."

"It's not them, Hamilton. It's me. I need a break. I need to be a girl for a while. I've been a boy for four months straight, and I'm about to go crazy. I wanted to go to Paris and wear dresses and buy an insane number of shoes that I'll never wear."

"If that's all, you could still go to Paris and just not see as much of your mother. I mean, you're pretty good at taking care of yourself."

"I could, but it's too painful to be around all of her stuff and . . . to know that she's nearby but just doesn't have the time to . . ." Jake stopped and changed tracks. "Besides, you won't be there. At least if I go to New York, maybe you can come visit me again."

"If you come to my house, you can see me all the time. And you can be a girl after my parents go to bed. You can paint your toenails and wear dresses and dance around in your underwear and prove to me what a woman you are. In fact, I encourage you to do all of those things."

Jake smiled but shook her head. "No, I can't, Hamilton. But thanks for offering."

* * *

Phase three of Hamilton's elaborate prank took them back to the boys' dorm. As they stepped out of the doorway onto the roof, Jake looked at the large satellite dish and remembered the last time she'd been there. It had been with Hamilton, when they'd first met at the beginning of summer session. Hamilton had thought she was a boy, and she had tried her best to play the part. But she'd been so taken by him; she thought he was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen. And she couldn't help herself. Something inside her had taken over –

"Hey, remember this place?" Hamilton asked. "Where you launched me on my journey of sexual confusion?"

"I remember."

He pulled her toward him and looked in her eyes. "This was where we had our first kiss."

"As I recall, I did all of the kissing. You just kind of stood there."

"Yeah, I did."

And then something dawned on Jake that she hadn't thought about before. "But you didn't back away."

"No, I didn't."

"Wow . . . " she started.

"What?"

"You're gay!"

"Shut up!" He kissed her, and she tried to stop laughing and kiss him back. It was true, having him around made all the bad things go away. How she would get through three weeks without him she didn't know.

Jake halfheartedly pulled away. "Alright, do you want to get this done or not? I bet Colin Prescott didn't let himself get distracted during a prank."

"I doubt that Colin Prescott ever had a girlfriend." Hamilton kissed her once more then let go of her. Jake opened her backpack and pulled out her laptop. She turned it on and waited for it to boot up while Hamilton walked over to the wall and picked up two folding chairs and a blanket.

He set out one of the chairs for her. "Have a seat."

"Wow, you really planned this well, Fleming. You don't neglect a single detail, do you?"

"Nothing but the best for my partner-in-crime."

Jake sat down and started typing. "I just have to make the remote connection with the server," she explained. "It shouldn't take long."

Hamilton sat down in a chair next to her, thinking about their earlier conversation. "I don't know if I'd be able to visit you in New York again. My parents take the holidays pretty seriously. It's the one time of year that my dad stops being the Dean for a second and becomes just Dad."

Jake looked at him and smiled slightly. "You're lucky."

"Lucky how?"

"You're lucky to have a real family."

"A real family? Is that what you call growing up with two parents who were always busy playing mom and dad to three hundred teenage boys who were all total assholes to me?"

"But at least you have your parents. At least you always knew where you were going to be for Christmas."

"Yeah. Christmas. I got to open a million presents and then have no one to play with." Hamilton paused to rub his hands together and blow on them for warmth. When he continued, the bitterness in his voice eased into a sad irony. "When I was nine, I got these really cool Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers pajamas I'd been begging my parents to get me for Christmas. They weren't like those thin pajamas like the other super hero ones; they were warm, more like long underwear. Anyway, my mom got me two pairs so when I had a friend spend the night we could both wear them. But it was over a year before I had another sleep-over, and I outgrew them."

"Your friends didn't come over very often?"

"Not so much. We're so isolated out here, and it seems really far from town when you're a little kid. Besides, you don't make that many friends when you're home schooled."

"But you went to a real school for a while."

"That was when we first moved here, and I was only seven then. I think my parents didn't like the curriculum at the public school, or maybe it was the environment. I don't remember what their excuse was. I think my mom just wanted to keep an eye on me all day. At the elementary school I'd disappear in the middle of the day, and they'd find me hiding in the coat closet."

"Wait, so your mom taught all your subjects?"

"I had a separate math teacher but other than that, yeah. My mom wasn't much into science, either, at least not the textbook version. So science was mostly just 'appreciating the world around me' type stuff. We'd go out in the day and look at bugs, go out at night and look at stars." As he spoke, Hamilton gazed up at the clear night sky.

Jake watched his face, watched him smile slightly as he remembered. His life, his past, was so much the opposite of hers. So much time with his mother when he would rather have been at school with friends.

"Anyway," Hamilton summed up, "mostly I just hung out by myself."

"Yeah, I know that story."

"I guess you probably do."

Jake's attention was pulled back to the computer screen by a beeping. "OK, we've got the connection."

Hamilton turned to her with a grin and raised his eyebrows. "We're almost there, baby."

"Almost." She opened her backpack, pulled out a disk and slipped it into the drive. "Here goes nothing."

"Here goes project 'Merry Christmas Rawley.'" Hamilton leaned forward and looked down at the snow-covered quad, now dark except for the pools beneath the path lights, where students hurried toward the dining hall for their last supper before leaving campus. The bus for the airport wouldn't leave until seven the next morning, so almost everyone was still around. Hamilton looked at Jake, who was obviously trying to suppress her own misery and put on an excited face for him. "I guess it's not such a Merry Christmas, is it?" he asked.

Jake shook her head and tried to lighten the mood. The last thing she wanted was to ruin his holiday. "So, besides Power Rangers pajamas, what else did you want for Christmas when you were a kid?"

Hamilton was quiet for a moment, knowing the answer but hesitant to say it. "A little brother or sister."

"Really?"

"I was always asking my parents to have another kid."

"What would they say?"

Hamilton shrugged. "They just bought me a puppy instead. Every time I asked if they were going to have another baby, they gave me another puppy. Pretty soon I stopped asking. I mean, there are only so many dogs I can walk in a given day."

"So that's how you ended up with so many dogs."

"I just wanted somebody to play with, you know?"

"Somebody to wear the matching pajamas?"

"Yeah." Hamilton turned to Jake, and she took her eyes away from her computer screen long enough to gaze back at him for a moment. She looked into his clear blue eyes, and she could see the child that he was, not so long ago. It broke her heart to think of him so lonely.

They stared at each other silently, then turned their attention to the library rooftop across the quad, where the hijacked computer monitors were stacked near the edge to form a four-by-three grid, tilting slightly forward so as to be viewable from the ground below. All the screens lit up at once.

"All right, we're live and on the air," Jake said. "Time for lights out."

"Here we go." Hamilton's excitement came back to him, and he draped an arm around Jake's shoulders. It was all going according to plan.

Jake hit a few keys on her laptop, and the gymnasium building went completely dark.

"Gym's out," Hamilton said.

Jake punched a few more keys. "Girls' Dorm."

"Check."

"Boys' Dorm."

"Check."

Hacking into the electrical system to create a blackout – and get everyone's attention -- had been Jake's idea, and Hamilton loved it. He saw one last building succumb to darkness, so that only the library remained live. "Dining hall -- check. Cue the music."

Jake punched a few more keys. "Merry Christmas."

From somewhere above the quad, the familiar opening strains of a Christmas carol broke the silent night and boomed across the campus.

_Oh come, all ye faithful  
__Joyful and triumphant . . .___

And come they did. With the dining hall darkened, several students wandered outside and looked up to see the only light in the quad coming down from the roof of the library. They ran back inside and brought out other students.

Jake and Hamilton leaned forward and rested their arms on the ledge before them, watching the gathering crowd.

"I just think it'd be better with real fireworks, or at least some Roman candles," Hamilton complained.

"Hey, I've got nothing against pyrotechnics, but firecrackers are illegal in this state. I'm just trying to keep you out of jail. Besides, I think our computer version works just fine."

The computer screens lit up with colorful bursts of fireworks, the noisy crackling and blasts of canon-fire overwhelming the closing stanza of 'Oh Come, All Ye Faithful.' The sound system ratcheted up with a burst of heavy metal guitar, as Victorian choral music gave way to Quiet Riot's 'Cum On Feel the Noise.'

The quad below them was now full of people watching the display, and only now did the real show begin. The initial fireworks were replaced by images that Hamilton had created and Jake had split to fill up the twelve screens as if they were one – scratchy photos of Rawley teachers and students, colored over with fluorescent pink and green and animated like a rock video. They were an accumulation of photographs that Hamilton had secretly taken over the last year: the football team throwing up in the lake after a drunken celebration, a gym teacher sneaking a cigarette, Finn grabbing his crotch before yet another group of entering freshmen as he explained to them where 'passion' comes from. Laughter and cheers erupted from the ever-growing throng of students. A photo of the Dean kissing his wife by the lake elicited a collective "Awww" from the crowd. It was all in good taste, some of the photos a bit risqué, some a bit embarrassing for the individuals involved, but none of it mean.

Hamilton took it all in, admiring his own handiwork. He desperately wanted to go down and take credit for it all. He turned to Jake and was rewarded with her awestruck grin as she watched with her eyes glued to the display. For a moment he just watched her watching the show.

Jake was amazed. She'd seen most of the pictures before, since Hamilton had done a lot of the work on her computer, with its superior version of Photoshop. But he had put the final show together by himself, partly as a surprise for her. And it was even more impressive on the big screen they had created.

Jake turned to Hamilton, and he was looking at her, watching her reaction. She could tell by the look on his face that he didn't really care what the crowd in the quad thought; the only opinion that really mattered to him was hers. He so wanted to make her happy. And she wanted him to be happy.

And she wanted him to have someone to play with on Christmas morning.

"Hamilton?"

"Yeah?"

"You really think your parents wouldn't mind if –"

"I know they wouldn't," Hamilton interrupted eagerly. "And even if they did, I'd talk them into it."

Jake took a deep breath and bit her lip. "Then I want to spend Christmas at your place."

Beaming, Hamilton reached over and took her hand. "Jake, it's gonna be the best Christmas ever."

"Yeah, I think it will be."

Finally, the flashing images stopped, the music faded, and a message scrolled across the monitors:

HO, HO, HO! MERRY CHRISTMAS, RAWLEY! REMEMBER, SANTA KNOWS WHEN YOU'VE BEEN NAUGHTY – AND HE LIKES IT.

As the word 'naughty' scrolled across, a bright flare popped up into the sky overhead and burst into colored flame.

"Hamilton!" Jake yelled. Only then did she notice the tiny device in his hand.

Hamilton smirked proudly. "Did you think you're the only one who can set up a remote trigger?" Jake shot him a dirty look, but he shrugged it off. "Hey, one Roman candle never hurt anybody."

Jake shook her head but laughed in spite of herself. She leaned back as the show ended. The crowd of students below erupted with applause and cheers.

Hamilton threw his arm around Jake and pulled her close to him. He kissed her ear and murmured, "Not bad for our first try, huh?"

"We're only freshmen," she teased. "We've got time to work on it."

"I gotta say, Pratt, we make a pretty good team."

Jake rested her head on Hamilton's shoulder. "Colin Prescott, eat your heart out."

**THE END**


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